Positioning and housing of crusher gauges



Jan. 27, 1959 FIG. 9. M 341 JMWV C W. MUSSER ETAL POSITIONING AND HOUSING OF CRUSHER GAUGES Filed April 29, 1955 INVENTORS C WALTON MUSSER. LLOYD W. INSETTA ATTORNEYS:

upon the piston.

POSITIONIN AND HOUSING F CRUSHER GAUGES 'C Walton Musser, Levittown, and Lloyd W. Insetta, Feasterville, Pa.

Application April 29, 1955, Serial No. 505,068

7 Claims. (Cl. 73167) (Granted under Title 35, U. S. Code (1952), see. 266) The invention described herein may be manufactured and used by or for the Government for governmental purposes without payment of any royalty thereon.

This invention relates to a means for positioning and housing crusher gauges in determination of pressure values within the interior of weapons.

It has been customary in the art to utilize crusher gauges for measuring the pressure developed at different points within the interior of weapons such as guns, small arms, recoilless rifles, catapults, and other fluid-pressureactuated devices of the kind. A commonly-used gauge is acopper cylinder approximately one-fourth inch in diameter and four-tenths inch long. Such cylinders are produced from a single melt to assure uniformity of response, and are calibrated lot-wise so that pressure values may be reflected in cylinder deformation or set.

To obtain a pressure reading at any desired point within a weapon, the weapon is tapped at such a point to accommodate a piston assembly that places the piston element in communication at one end with the weapon interior. On the weapon exterior a crusher gauge is clamped over the opposite, exposed end of the piston so that pressure within the weapon may act upon the crusher gauge through the agency of the piston.

Heretofore it has been necessary to rely upon a hand positioning of the small crusher gauges for clamping This necessitated side ports or access apertures in the clamping means. The disadvantages of manual positioning are that the crusher gauge is thus not reliably centered and is frequently clamped in a cocked or out-of-perpendicular relation with the piston. These inaccuracies produce erroneous results. The disadvantage of a clamping means having side ports is that the crusher gauge, becoming unclamped or freed consequent upon its deformational response and recession of the piston upon subsidence of pressure, may be dislodged by weapon set-back and concussion, ejected through a port, and thus lost or confused with gauges similarly ejected from other measuring stations.

It is therefore an object of our invention to provide an improved means foraccurately positioning a crusher gauge for clamping. such a means a fully-housing clamping facility coupled with ability to free the gauge from the positioning means, after clamping, for unimpeded deformational response.

We have accomplished the foregoing objects by devising an embodiment whereby a gauge may be mechanically positioned accurately in center and in true perpendicularity, clamped against a pressure-transmitting piston in a substantially fully-closed housing in cooperation with the piston assembly and in that inaccessible condition, released from the mechanical positioning means for unimpeded deformation by the pressure force acting upon the piston.

A structure fulfilling the objects of the invention is described with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:

Another object is to provide in 2,870,631 Patented Jan. 27, 1959 h s, g

tel-'4 Figure 1 is a vertical view of the structure, partly in elevation and partly in section, in operative relation with a piston assembly mounted in a gun tube.

Figure 2 is a vertical section taken along line 22 of Figure 1 showing the gauge positioning means engaged upon an unused gauge.

Figure 3 is a vertical section presenting details of the structure in condition for a measurement of pressure, with the gauge positioning means disengaged to allow unimpeded deformational response.

Figure 4 is a vertical section depicting the structure of the invention immediately following its use and before disconnection from the piston assembly, with the gauge positioning means still disengaged and a used, deformed gauge still in position over the piston.

Figure 5 is a vertical section presenting the structure with the positioning means re-engaged upon a used, deformed gauge, for recovery, and with the structure of the invention as a whole, separated from the piston assembly.

Figure 6 is a transverse section taken along line 66 of Figure 2 showing a detail of the positioning means engaged upon a gauge.

Figure 7 is a transverse section taken along line 77 in Figure 3, illustrating a detail of the positioning-means moving mechanism.

Figure 8 is a transverse section along line 8-8 in Figure 3 and presents a detail of slotting for adapting the positioning means.

Figure 9 is a transverse section along line 99 of Figure 4 showing connection between the positioning means and its moving mechanism.

Reverting now to Figure 1, the numeral 10 denotes a portion of a weapon tube into which a piston assembly 11 is threadedly engaged by way of piston assembly extension 12. Passage 13 communicates between the interior of the weapon tube and a bore 14 adapting a piston 15.

With reference to Figure 2, the piston assembly includes a tubular, internally threaded extensionlti, vented to atmosphere as at 17, for adapting the described embodiment of the invention whose exterior is correspondingly threaded as at 13.

Referring now to Figure 4, the exemplary device comprises an essentially cylindrical body member 19 having a knurled flange Ztl to facilitate manual installation into and removal from extension 16. The body 19 is apertured centrally to provide bore 21. A counterbore 22 at the upper extremity of the bore 21 is provided to adapt a knob 23, having a knurled flange to facilitate manual rotation, which is held in rotational relation with the body 19 cooperatively by a spring retaining ring 24 and annular grooves 25 and 26 respectively in body 19 and knob 23. At its lower extremity, the bore 21 is counterbored as at 27 to adapt in press-fit relation an anvil 28. A second counterbore 29 on a somewhat larger radius is provided to house partially a gauge and a later-to-bedescribed gauge positioning means.

With reference to Figure 5, a screw 31 is fitted into bore 21. This screw is in freely-sliding relation with the bore and along its upper portion is threaded lefthandedly. The knob 23 is tapped and threaded lefthandedly as at 32 for cooperation with the threads upon the screw 31 so that when the knob is rotated clockwise, as viewed from above, the screw is driven farther into the bore 21. As will appear from a later description of use, this left-handedly threaded arrangement provides for a unidirectional rotation of both flange 20 and knob 23, in fitting the device, when containing a positioned gauge, into a piston assembly for clamping, and for releasing the positioning means from the gauge after it has been clamped.

Again in Figure 5, the lower portion of the screw 31 is fashioned with a plurality of keys 33. These keys engage a plurality of cooperating slots 34 cut into body 19 from the rim of its lower extremity upwardly and inclined toward the center of the body so that they terminate in bore '21. The keys 33 are so proportioned relative to the slots 34 that though they remain slotted in the lowermost positioninto which screw 31 is displaceable, sutlicient clearance between the keys and their cooperating slots prevails to allow an operatively sufficient upward displacementof the screw. As a result of this keying of the screw 31, it is prevented from rotating; upward and downward displacement in response to a rotation of cooperatively threaded knob 23 is thus assured. The clearance between keys .33. and slots 34 for upward displacement of screw 31 is illustrated in Figure 7.

Further-in Figure 5, the screw 31, below keys 3.3, is grooved annularly as at 35 to adapt the upper extremities of a plurality of gauge positioning jaws 36. These jaws are symmetrically disposed about the center of body 19,

are engaged in slots 34 and corresponding slots 37 in anvil 28 for reciprocation therein in response to displacement of screw 31. The slotting just described is illustrated in Figure 8.

When the screw 31 is caused to move upwardly it entrains the jaws 36 through their upper, follower extremity engaged in the groove 35 as illustrated in detail in Figure 9. As they are constrained by the anvil to follow the centrally inclined body slots in which they are seated, the jaws are caused uniformly to approach toward the center of the structure and hence to narrow the gap between their lower, finger-like extremity. In this manner the jaws may be made to close about a gauge as illustrated in Figures 2, and 6 for centering and holding the same until clamped. When the screw 31 is caused to be displaced in a downwardly direction, the jaws are displaced downwardly, caused to spread, and the finger-like extremities then become retracted from the gauge 30 as illustrated in Figures 3 and 4.

Although the precision of construction of the instant structure, as a whole, is an indispensible factor in achieving a true centering of a gauge, the anvil 28 should be fashioned and seated with particular care for it is the reference whereby perpendicularity is assured.

The mode of use of our improved means is first to rotate knob 23 clockwise whereby because of the lefthanded threading, screw 31 is displaced downwardly and the jaws 36 are spread. Next a gauge is placed operatively against anvil 28, and knob 23 is rotated counter-clockwise until the gauge is firmly centered and held within the jaws as detailed in Figure 6. Then the structure is threaded clockwise from above into union with a cooperating piston assembly and tightened by means of flange to firmly clamp the gauge between anvil Z8 and the head of piston 15. Finally knob 23 is rotated in the same direction as was flange 20 whereby the jaws 34 are displaced downwardly in their slots and thus retracted to free the gauge for unimpeded deformational response.

From the foregoing description, it will be evident that the present invention provides a means whereby a crusher gauge may be mechanically positioned accurately in center and in true perpendicularity, clamped against a pressuretransmitting piston in a substantially fully-closed housing in cooperation with a piston assembly and in that inaccessible condition, disengaged for deformational response and re-engaged for recovery. Also, it will be evident to those skilled in the art that the means of the invention'may be utilized for positioning and housing crusher gauges wherecver the latter may be utilized in measurement of pressure. The structure shown and described herein is exemplary and should be considered illustrative, not limitative.

We claim:

1. In a structure for positioning and housing a crusher gauge upon a pressure-transmitting assembly, for determination of pressure values within the interior of a weapon: a body in which a gauge is substantially fully enclosed when stationed for response to pressure; a fixed reference means supported within the body for establishing perpendicularity of a gauge when operatively positioned thereagainst; movable means supported within the body for centering and engaging a gauge upon the fixed reference means; means for couplingthe body to a pressure-transmitting assembly for clamping a gauge in a substantially fully housed condition against the pressure-transmitting element of the pressure-transmitting assembly for deformational response; and moving means supported within and extending from the body and operatively connected to said movable means whereby the latter may be caused to disengage and engage a gauge, at will.

2. In a structure for positioning and housing a crusher gauge upon a pressure-transmitting assembly, for determination of pressure values Within the interior of a chamher: a body in which a gauge of the kind described is substantially fully enclosed when stationed for response to pressure; a fixed reference means supported within the body for establishing perpendicularity of a gauge when operatively positioned thereagainst; movable means supported within the body for centering and engaging a gauge upon the fixed reference means; moving means supported within the body and operatively connected to said movable means; means for coupling the body to a pressuretransmitting assembly for clamping a gauge in a substantially fully housed condition against the pressure-transmitting element of the pressure-transmitting assembly for deformational response; and means extending externally of the body operatively connected thereto and therethrough to the said moving means for actuation of the latter whereby the said movable means may be caused to disengage and engage a gauge, at will, when the body is in coupled, gauge'clamping relation with the said pressure-transmitting assembly.

3. A structure for positioning and housing a crusher gauge for determination of pressure values within the interior of a chamber, comprising: a body in which a crusher gauge is substantially fully enclosed when stationed for response to pressure; a fixed stop supported within the body for imparting perpendicularity to a gauge when operatively positioned thereagainst; a plurality of movable elements supported within the body and adapted to be closed about a gauge in position against said stop, for centering and engaging the gauge; movable means supported within the body and operatively engaged with aid movable elements for actuating the same; and moving means supported in the body, extending therefrom, and operatively connected to said movable means whereby the said elements may be actuated from without the said body for engagement and disengagement of the gauge.

4. In a structure for positioning and housing a crusher gauge upon a pressure-transmitting piston assembly for determination of pressure values within the interior of a chamber: a body in which a crusher gauge is substantlally fully enclosed when stationed for response to pressure; a fixed stop supported within the body for imparting perpendicularity to a gauge when operatively positioned thereagainst; a plurality of movable elements supported within said body; means upon said fixed stop and within said body to cooperatively guide said movable elements for convergence for centering and holding a gauge against said stop; movable means supported within said body and operatively engaged with said movable elements for actuating the same; and moving means rotatively supported in said body and extending therefrom, and operatively connected to said movable means, whereby the said elements may be caused to be actuated exteriorly of the said body.

5. The combination of a member having at one end an internally threaded extension and at the other end an aperture opening into a cylinder containing a piston, a screw having at one end a key and an annular slot,

5 a cylindrical body threadable into said extension and h ing a central opening encircling sa1d screw and slotted to provide for axial movement of said screw, an anvil mounted within said central opening oppositely to said piston, and a plurality of jaws coupled to said screw through said slot and movable therewith for positioning a crusher gauge on said anvil.

6. The combination of a member having at one end an internally threaded extension and at the other end an. aperture opening into a cylinder containing a piston, a screw having at one end a key and an annular slot, a cylindrical body threadable into said extension and having a central opening encircling said screw and slotted to provide for axial movement of said screw, an anvil mounted within said central opening oppositely to said piston, a plurality of jaws coupled to said screw through said slot and movable therewith for positioning a crusher gauge on said anvil, and a control member bearing against the exterior of said body and threaded onto said screw for adjusting the position of said jaws.

7. The combination of a member having at one end an internally threaded extension and at the other end an aperture opening into a cylinder containing a piston, a

screw having at one end a key and an annular slot, a plurality of gauge positioning jaws coupled to said screw through said slot, an anvil, a cylindrical body threaded into said extension and having a central opening encircling said screw and slotted to receive said key for axial movement of said screw, said central opening being counterbored to position said anvil oppositely to said piston and said anvil and said central opening having slots arranged to provide paths for movement of said jaws into and out of engagement with a crusher gauge, and a control member bearing against the exterior of said cylindrical body and threaded onto said screw for adjusting the position of said jaws.

References Cited in the file of this patent Germany May 10, 1930 

